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Gallery Notes Volume 20 Number 4

Gallery Notes Volume 20 Number 4 Page 1

The Memorial Art Gallery
OF THE UNIVERSITY OF ROCHESTER
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GALLERY NOTES
• ROCHESTER 3, NEW YORK
NEW ACCESSIONS FROM THE LAND OF THE FOREBAYS
Vol. 20, No. 4 - February-March, 1955
Since hunting in "Penn's Woods" for Pennsylvania German folk
art has been a popular sport for generations, it is rare, indeed, to
be able to "snare" significant examples of it in this motor-motel
age. Last summer, however, through the special interest of Mrs.
Hattie Brunner of Reinholds.who has helped to assemble several
of the most important public and private collections of folk art in
the country, the Gallery acquired a small but excellent group of
Pennsylvania German fractur drawings, weavings, wrought-iron,
tin and carved wood articles. This month they join the homey yet
colorful array of Americana crafts In the "Folk Art Corner" In Gallery A. There they team up with a quartet of Pennsylvania colleagues already in the collection — an early 19th Century cast-
iron stove plate, a pair of slipware pie dishes, and a painted
bride's box that may or may not have been decorated before its
young miss left her native Palatinate.
Outstanding among the group of colorful fracturs or illuminated
drawings that the Gallery has acquired is a rare, gaily painted "Vor-
schrift", or exercise piece, written by one Joseph Hofman in 1808,
with intricately interlaced capital and headings that strikingly recall the calligraphic patterns of ancient Celtic work. Beside the
typical vorschrift features of Bible text, verse and in this case, a
somewhat wobbly alphabet, the Gallery's fractur boasts an added
attraction in a tulip-bedecked portrait of General George Washington, also somewhat wobbly, but nicely
labelled in case his Olympian features are not easily recognized. The magical "distilflnk", tulip, hearts
and flowering urns decorate the other birth and baptismal certificates — one of which was printed on the
early presses at Ephrata Cloisters in 1804- A "Show" towel — the German hausfrau's cover-up for the unsightly kitchen roller towel — which boasts the weaver's name, the date of 1830, and typical peacocks and
hearts all carefully worked out in cross-stitch, is another outstanding item in the collection.
THE FEBRUARY EXHIBITIONS "THE ART OF LIVING: FROM CAVE TO RANCH-HOUSE"
20,000 years of home life as viewed by the artist will be the subject of an unusual, annual February children's
exhibit assembled by the Education Department.
The festive opening on February 4th at 4 P.M. will offer to small eyes a large view of homemakers'
activities through the ages. A prehistoric cave and five model houses, constructed with consummate skill
VORSCHRIFT 1808
PENNSYLVANIA GERMAN

The Memorial Art Gallery
OF THE UNIVERSITY OF ROCHESTER
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19
GALLERY NOTES
• ROCHESTER 3, NEW YORK
NEW ACCESSIONS FROM THE LAND OF THE FOREBAYS
Vol. 20, No. 4 - February-March, 1955
Since hunting in "Penn's Woods" for Pennsylvania German folk
art has been a popular sport for generations, it is rare, indeed, to
be able to "snare" significant examples of it in this motor-motel
age. Last summer, however, through the special interest of Mrs.
Hattie Brunner of Reinholds.who has helped to assemble several
of the most important public and private collections of folk art in
the country, the Gallery acquired a small but excellent group of
Pennsylvania German fractur drawings, weavings, wrought-iron,
tin and carved wood articles. This month they join the homey yet
colorful array of Americana crafts In the "Folk Art Corner" In Gallery A. There they team up with a quartet of Pennsylvania colleagues already in the collection — an early 19th Century cast-
iron stove plate, a pair of slipware pie dishes, and a painted
bride's box that may or may not have been decorated before its
young miss left her native Palatinate.
Outstanding among the group of colorful fracturs or illuminated
drawings that the Gallery has acquired is a rare, gaily painted "Vor-
schrift", or exercise piece, written by one Joseph Hofman in 1808,
with intricately interlaced capital and headings that strikingly recall the calligraphic patterns of ancient Celtic work. Beside the
typical vorschrift features of Bible text, verse and in this case, a
somewhat wobbly alphabet, the Gallery's fractur boasts an added
attraction in a tulip-bedecked portrait of General George Washington, also somewhat wobbly, but nicely
labelled in case his Olympian features are not easily recognized. The magical "distilflnk", tulip, hearts
and flowering urns decorate the other birth and baptismal certificates — one of which was printed on the
early presses at Ephrata Cloisters in 1804- A "Show" towel — the German hausfrau's cover-up for the unsightly kitchen roller towel — which boasts the weaver's name, the date of 1830, and typical peacocks and
hearts all carefully worked out in cross-stitch, is another outstanding item in the collection.
THE FEBRUARY EXHIBITIONS "THE ART OF LIVING: FROM CAVE TO RANCH-HOUSE"
20,000 years of home life as viewed by the artist will be the subject of an unusual, annual February children's
exhibit assembled by the Education Department.
The festive opening on February 4th at 4 P.M. will offer to small eyes a large view of homemakers'
activities through the ages. A prehistoric cave and five model houses, constructed with consummate skill
VORSCHRIFT 1808
PENNSYLVANIA GERMAN